Run Boy Run
by DarylDixon'sgirl1985
Summary: When Voldemort takes over the Ministry of Magic the changes he and his people enact are slight at first. But Ted Tonks sees the writing on the wall and makes a plan with Dean. A plan to find safety for themselves and people like them. So they go on the road in a search to find safety and hopefully not get caught by the Snatchers. Will they succeed or will they fail?


**Hey everyone! This story was brought to you by Game Development assignment on Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. **

**Game Development - Task 6 Altair from Assassin's Creed - Write about someone on the run**

**Warnings for character death and in canon torture. Word Count without Author's Note is 1,939 words. I hope you all enjoy Run Boy Run.**

The Muggleborns and Muggles are the first to feel the change when Voldemort and his lot take over the Ministry of Magic. It's slight changes at first. Like the Muggleborn registration act, were all the Muggleborns had to go and register themselves with the Ministry. The Half-bloods didn't have it as bad because at least they had one magical parent. They didn't have the taint of Muggle on them.

Dean Thomas looked around him in the line at the registration office. There were a lot more Muggleborns than he'd thought there would be. Especially considering they were of varying ages, too.

"I wonder why we never had to register before now," he hears a woman nearby remark to her pureblood husband.

"It is a bit odd, dear," the man says gently, trying to allay her fears. "But don't you worry, everything will be alright."

Dean couldn't help but wonder if this was more wishful thinking on the man's part, or if everything would eventually be alright. He looked around the line at the men standing guard at the doorways. This struck him as especially odd, too. Why would you have people standing guard at the doors if this was just for registering to say you were Muggleborn?

"This doesn't feel right," the man behind him in line says. "My daughter says things are getting worse here by the day."

"Does your daughter work here?" Dean asks, turning towards the man behind.

The sandy haired man nods with a smile. "She's an Auror," he says proudly. "My Nymphadora. Or at least, she was the last time we talked. Probably not anymore, considering the group she's….."

Dean can tell the man's stopped himself before he can say too much. He nods in understanding. He remembers being part of Dumbledore's Army and guesses they'd probably be illegal now too.

"I was part of Dumbledore's Army at Hog…."

"Not too loud," the man tells him in a hushed whisper. "Especially considering it has something to do with Dumbledore and Harry Potter both." He looks around, then leans closer to Dean. "Meet me in Leaky Cauldron after registering. I think I have something you might need to hear, son."

"Who am I meeting?" Dean asks.

"Oh, sorry about that," the man sighs and holds out his hand. "I'm Ted Tonks, and we can talk more after. My daughter says the Ministry isn't a safe place to talk at all."

Dean nods in agreement as he shakes Ted Tonks's hand. "I'm Dean Thomas," he says as the witch at the closest window motions him over.

############################################################################

Dean looks around the Leaky Cauldron for the man he'd met at the Ministry's Muggleborn Registration office. After the questioning and other poking and prodding he'd been subject to, he wants to hear what this man has to say. Finding Ted Tonks and a woman who looks suspiciously like Bellatrix Lestrange sitting at a table towards the Muggle side of London, he walks over and sits down.

"Dean," Ted says as though they were old friends instead of people who'd just met hours ago, "this is my wife Andromeda Tonks. Andromeda, this Dean Thomas, the lad I was telling you about on the way here."

"It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Dean," Andromeda says, shaking Dean's hand with a sad smile.

"It's nice to meet you too, Mrs. Tonks," Dean says.

"I'll let you boys talk," the dark haired woman says, standing up and giving Ted a lingering hug. "It was nice meeting you, Dean. Hopefully we will be able to meet again at some point."

He wonders why she sounds so sad and doesn't have long to wait after she walks away from the table and towards the doorway to Diagon Alley.

"My daughter has been fired for being a Half-blood, as the Ministry puts it," Ted tells him. "This new Registration thing happens to be a way for them to keep track of us, Dean—the Muggleborns. She also says that she overheard plans for Azkaban to be made ready for an influx of prisoners."

"What are you saying, sir?" Dean asks, letting it sink in that they might not be safe sitting here at all.

"Do live in Muggle London?" Ted asks, shifting something on the floor beside his chair.

"Yes." Dean looks around, readying for an attack or something to come out of nowhere. "Why do ask?"

"Because they're readying the prison cells for us, Dean." The reply is simple and terrifying at the same time. It's both of their worst fears and it's going to become true. "That's the last thing my daughter overheard before she was fired. But I have a plan."

Dean leans forward, interested to at least hear this man out. Ted didn't have to let him about this after all. He could have left Dean out to dry with the other Muggleborns, but he didn't.

"What's the plan?" Dean asks.

"We go on the run," Ted tells him as though he's thought this through on several different occasions. "We go on the run and help as many people as we can to safety."

"But where is safe?"

"I don't know," Ted says with a shrug. "Which is why I'm hoping you'll be the first person to come with me. We'll find safety for us and people like us and we'll come back and take them there. You don't have to, of course, but if you do it would be very helpful to me."

"I'm in," Dean says.

That night, he and Ted Tonks walk to his house. Dean gathers a few of his belongings together in an old backpack he used to use for school before going to Hogwarts. Finding an old sleeping bag of his father's, he and Ted set out on their journey.

############################################################################

They've been traveling for twenty days when they first hear about the Snatchers and what their purpose is. Dean has to admit that Ted had seen this coming a mile away. He'd said just a few weeks ago that soon they'd bee hunting down Muggleborns to torture or what have you.

"Sad about that Harvey girl," one of the nearby campers was saying. "Just kidnapped out her front yard by those roughians."

"I know," another one was saying. "Especially considering how strangely they were dressed. Poor girl."

Dean takes the information back with him to Ted when he returns from his walk around the campsite. Ted doesn't look like this is new news to him, which it probably isn't. His daughter might have warned him.

"Don't unpack," Ted tells him tersely. "We won't be staying here tonight."

And they don't. They have a quick lunch which consists of some of the granola bars they'd bought from the Muggle convenience store before leaving London. Dean looks at their provisions with a growing unease. They're going to have to make a provisions run one of these days or else they'll go hungry.

As soon as they're done with their lunch, they're back up and walking again. Ted looks like a man with a purpose, which Dean knows is true. He's looking for a safe place for him and his family. For people like Dean and others like the two of them. Dean hears a sigh leave the older man and turns to look at Ted.

"I'm sorry about being so terse back there, Dean," Ted says. "I knew this was a possibility. Nymphadora had heard rumors of them finding people for just this purpose. I just didn't think that it would happen this soon."

"What would happen?" Dean asked.

"They're trying to either kill off the Muggleborn population, or something much more nefarious. I'm just not sure which," Ted sighs.

They make camp for the night in a little clearing near a spring which they use to catch fish. Things are tense that night, but there is also hope they are close to finding what Ted calls the promised land. The place that they and all the Muggleborns will be safe.

############################################################################

He's not sure for how much longer they're traveling when they have the scare, but Dean knows he's never been more afraid in his entire life. They are just setting up camp under the watchful eye of Griphook when they hear the crunching of leaves. He turns to Ted, who looks like a deer caught in the headlights.

"What do we do?" Ted asks.

Dean takes hold of his wand and pulls it. If they're going to be caught, he's going to go down with a fight. But then he sees Griphook, who's all but defenseless. They need to keep Griphook safe; after his betrayal of his kind, they know he's as good as dead.

"Get Griphook out of here," he instructs Ted as he waits for the Snatchers to crash through the trees in front of them. "Get him to safety."

"What about you, Dean?" Ted asks, watching the young boy with amazement. "You have more to live for than either of us do."

"That's not true. You have a daughter. Didn't she get married recently?"

Dean feels bad about using this information against Ted, but he doesn't want to be responsible for someone losing their parent.

"We stay together," Ted says insistently, and Dean knows that that's the final word on the matter. "My family will understand."

Dean nods and they get ready for the attack that never comes. Ted tells Dean the next day as they prepare to leave the campsite that it was probably some Muggles camping. They should be safe for the time being.

############################################################################

But three days later, that theory is proven wrong. They'd just settled down for the night after a nice dinner of trout from a nearby lake. Griphook lay sound asleep with his back towards Dean and Ted. The rise and fall of the goblin's chest was the only thing letting them know he was still alive. Ted was just spreading his sleeping bag out when the inevitable happened.

"What have we here?" came the taunting voice from the leader of this particular group of Snatchers. "What are your names, lads?"

Dean was about to tell the Snatchers that they were just a father and son duo on a camping trip when he hears Ted tell them his name.

"So you're Ted Tonks," the creepy looking man murmurs as he looks at both Dean and Ted. "And who's your little boyfriend here, Teddy?"

Another one of the Snatchers looks past the leader of the group and murmurs something into the man's ear. Dean could hear something that sounded like "the goblin who broke into Lestrange's vault at Gringotts" as he continues to point towards Griphook.

Both Dean and Ted jump into motion, pulling wands from shirt sleeves and pointing them at their attackers. They won't just let themselves or Griphook get taken by these Snatchers. So the battle begins.

It doesn't last long before someone uses one of the Unforgivable Curses. He sees the flash of green light and hears the thud of a body falling towards the ground. Turning, Dean sees the dead body of Ted Tonks lying on the ground between Griphook and the lead Snatcher. Then everything goes black and hope is gone.

**I hope you all enjoyed Run Boy Run.**


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